Continuing the series of updates on things the Trump administration has been doing to attack our health and wellness, today I close out the work week with a quickie:
3. Attacking our access to medications
On September 9 RFK released the final version of his “Make America Healthy Again” strategy. There are lots of online resources where public health professionals have gone bit by bit through that report to talk about all the ways it won’t make America healthy again (like this and this and this) so I won’t repeat that here. One thing I do want to lift up is the report’s note that the new Make America Healthy Again Commission will aim to “enhance prior authorization,” supposedly to avoid “overmedicalization,” especially for conditions like ADHD. To keep more money in the pockets of health insurance companies, more like it. Prior authorization is a practice that often leads to insurance companies denying patients costly medications even when both the patients and their doctors have discussed and decided that this treatment is the one they need. Because why wouldn’t you want insurance companies saying “no thanks” even when your trusted doctor thinks you need a medication?